Jalan Jalan

by Mike Stoner

  Charles goes to the fridge and takes two Heinekens out. I’d forgotten other beers existed in this land of Bintang and Anker. Europe survives without me. It still makes its own beer, still extends its prying tentacles searching for the smallest of profit into the faraway reaches of the rest of the world. I’d prefer a Bintang but I take the Heineken with thanks.

  Charles flicks the TV on and we each sit in an armchair. He reaches for the video remote and a Manchester United–Arsenal game comes on.

  ‘Mr Beckham relaxes me. He is the best thing from your country.’

  ‘Something of a god in this country,’ I say.

  ‘Yes. The only Western god most of these Indonesians are willing to accept.’

  I pull the ring from my beer and take a swig.

  ‘So what do you want to ask me?’ He sits back in his chair and puts his feet on the table. He sighs and wiggles in his chair as though trying to achieve comfort, then takes his feet off and sits upright again.

  ‘Are you OK?’ I ask.

  ‘Yes. Just tired. Is that what you wanted to know?’

  ‘No. I’d like your help with something.’

  He nods and keeps watching the match.

  ‘It’s actually to help a friend of mine.’

  ‘If you ask for my help, you know I will want something in return.’

  I nod. ‘I thought you might.’

  But I have no idea what. Different possibilities shoot through my mind: free lessons, sell drugs to my students, give him money, lots of money. I have always wondered why he wanted me to teach his kids.

  ‘First you tell me what you want.’

  ‘Right.’ So I do. He listens and nods. He doesn’t interrupt. I tell him my idea of how he can help, and when I have finished he looks at me.

  ‘Why do you need me? You should do this on your own. And why do it anyway?’

  ‘Because I want to. I don’t want to sit back and hear about these things anymore and do nothing. And I want your help because I don’t want to risk screwing it up on my own. I’m just not physically up to it.’

  Charles snorts.

  ‘That is maybe true, but if you are mentally adequate, you can do it alone. Trust me, I know about these things. I am not a strong man, but people think I am. Reputation is my biggest muscle.’

  ‘I don’t have that reputation.’

  ‘Are you sure? You are a little mystery to most, I think; that is a kind of reputation on its own.’

  ‘I just don’t want to mess up.’

  On the TV Beckham hits one off the post, but Charles expresses no emotion. His dark eyes don’t brighten at the near miss.

  ‘OK. So tell me where and when and it will happen. Although why you assume I can help with such a thing I do not know.’ A slight glimmer of something in his eyes at this, maybe humour, as he peers sideways at me.

  ‘Thank you. Is tomorrow night too soon?’

  He shakes his head.

  ‘Now, what you must do for me.’

  What will it be?

  —I go for the drug-selling, myself. Or maybe sexual pleasure to one of his business partners.

  —I hadn’t thought of that one.

  —Mafioso, numbnuts. It’s going to be gruesome.

  ‘Your mind is elsewhere,’ cuts in Charles, ‘your eyes have gone away.’

  ‘Sorry. It happens.’

  —Stop making it happen, will you.

  She seems to take notice.

  ‘You remember Teddy?’

  Oh shit.

  ‘The witch doctor?’

  ‘The dukun. You will see him. He will find out where your eyes and mind go and he will help you.’ He takes a long swig from his beer and then burps. ‘Excuse me. Too much gas in this piss.’

  I think I would have preferred the drug-selling rather than the dukun.

  ‘But that doesn’t help you,’ I say, hoping for a way out.

  ‘But it makes me happy. Teddy says he can help you, then he can help you.’

  ‘So why doesn’t he help you with your problem?’

  Charles shifts in his seat and the faintest of redness touches his cheeks.

  ‘Because I have told him not to and his power isn’t that strong. And do not mention it again.’ He looks at me and this time holds my gaze for an uncomfortable time. Some sort of warning passes unspoken, and then he looks back to the football. My heart beats heavy in my chest.

  ‘You will meet the dukun. I will ask him where and when and you will go there.’

  ‘OK. But it won’t help me either.’

  ‘Why? Because you don’t need help?’

  ‘Exactly.’

  Charles laughs suddenly and loudly.

  ‘There are so many things wound up in your body, between your shoulders, down in your insides, swirling around your fragile skull, I can almost hear them. You need help, believe me.’

  I think about telling him he is wrong or that he also has the same symptoms, but decide against it. Instead I thank him and walk back to the pool where Fitri still dangles her feet and drinks her Coke and Benny snores on his floating mattress.

  I sit quietly between Julie and Marty, like a piece of paper slid between two electrical contacts. Remove me and sparks might fly.

  Mei’s is busy tonight; we teachers, the usual lot, all present, albeit quieter and gloomier than normal and taking up the long table near the beer fridge. Also present are Barry and his gang: an unpleasant fifty-something German with a big moustache and his beautiful yet sad-looking twenty-something Indonesian wife beside him. With them an English retired businessman who changes allegiances in Mei’s every week or so and no one seems to mind because he is a man who expresses little opinion. In the far corner sits a group of six Indonesian men, and over all watches Mei from her place behind the counter. Her slips of paper for each drink taken for each table are impaled on the spike in front of her.

  ‘You should go over and whack him, man.’ Kim’s hair is sticking out at all angles, as though he’s just got up. ‘I fucking would if I were you. Fucking whack him.’

  ‘No you wouldn’t. You’re as pussy as the rest of us, Kim. Just slightly more stoned.’ Jussy wipes condensation down his bottle so it pools on the table.

  ‘I am not stoned.’ Kim sits more upright in his chair.

  ‘You’re never fucking straight, Kim. We all know it.’ Julie gives an unnatural shake of her head and blinks.

  ‘I think you’re talking about yourself there, Jooolie. You’re constantly twitching and fiddling like a fucking, a fucking twitchy English bitch on drugs.’

  ‘Kim, watch your mouth.’ Quiet yet surprisingly firm from Marty.

  Julie sighs.

  ‘Hey, everyone fucking gang up on the Yank, why don’t you?’

  ‘We’re not ganging up,’ says Julie.

  ‘You are. You fucking are.’ Kim runs his hands through his messy mop of hair, then laughs. ‘Finding out who my friends are. Fuuuck.’

  ‘You’re getting paranoid, Kim. Have a break from the grass, dude.’ Jussy flicks his little pool of water, sending a small spray across the table.

  ‘Fuuuck. Even the homeboy has turned.’

  ‘Like I said, Kim, paranoid.’

  I look over to Geoff, who is sitting unnoticed amongst us while the others debate their paranoia and addictions. He is sitting with his back to Mei and turned slightly sideways in his chair, presumably to avoid catching Barry’s eyes.

  ‘You alright, Geoff?’ I ask.

  ‘What?’ he comes back from somewhere. ‘Yeah, fine.’ He looks at me but his eyes wander over my left shoulder to Barry’s table, where they linger, then move back to the bottle on the table in front of him.

  The others sit silent for a moment to let fingers tap glass, hands run through hair and cabin fevers grow. I can feel the static growing around me as whatever is going on with Julie and Marty builds unspoken like a thunderstorm waiting to crack.

  Something is building in me too, as I look at the clock behind Mei. The hands have move
d on as though the universe has just bent and we’ve lost half an hour to the blackness of time warps and wormholes. I’ve been hoping they’d be here by now, but I’m also pleased they aren’t. No doubt now, as I wait and watch the clock, time will change its mind and make things move slowly in the sludge of this uncomfortable night.

  ‘What’s the matter with the faggot table tonight?’ Barry must be able to feel whatever it is emanating from our group. ‘Did someone break a nail?’

  The only one of us to make a sound is Kim, a sort of guffaw verging on a donkey bray, followed by an agreement. ‘Yes, this is a fucking faggot table tonight. Fucking twitching miserable Brits, a love-struck Aussie and a Montana moron.’

  We all just stare. I look for the hairline crack that must be running through Kim’s head somewhere. Jungle ganja breaking a good mind.

  Jussy just shakes his head at Kim, Julie’s hand grasps her Bintang as though she is about to swing it at him, and Marty’s face moves through various expressions as he probably tries to think of something to impress Julie and belittle Kim. Nothing leaves his mouth. Geoff is the only one who doesn’t react.

  I, on the other hand, am dealing with the other I, the other me, only I’m not sure which one is which anymore. There’s something trying to pull me up and out of my seat and punch Barry straight in the face. There’s another force keeping me stuck to the chair. Images of the bar in England, quaking in my shoes, being useless in the face of aggression, swirl around inside me. Thoughts of New Me facing up to the Ben Sherman shirt at Bukit Lawang mix in the mucky mental soup. Who am I to be tonight? I know who I want to be, but being afraid is the most crippling of afflictions.

  I look to the clock. It now struggles to move on. Time hangs off its arms like weights.

  They will be here soon, but I wish they were here, now, in this moment.

  —Why wait?

  Just what I need now to add to my schizoid confusion.

  —Why wait? You’ve got it in you. You froze once and that was OK. You learn from it. You have learnt. You weren’t scared of that Liverpudlian.

  —I was stoned. It wasn’t even me, either of me.

  —It was. Your mind was just free to let your body do what it wanted.

  —I’ll get pummelled. Or pee myself. Or both. Or I’ll just get tongue-tied and laughed at and end up looking a twat.

  —What do you care? What happened to the new you? Don’t give a shit, remember? Do whatever, say whatever, take no prisoners.

  That is true. She has a point. What’s happened to that?

  —Perhaps I can’t change, at the end of the day.

  —Misery? Loss? Poor little boy with dead girlfriend? Nothing matters? What happened to what I made you? You mean I died for no reason? Or perhaps your little Indian girlfriend, what’s her name, Eka? Perhaps she’s having more of an effect on you than you realise.

  —Oh shut up. She’s nothing compared to what you were. And you, you just died. That’s it exactly. Died with no consideration for me.

  —I didn’t do it deliberately. I just did it. I just forgot people drive on the other side of the road there. That’s all. So, yes, I died with no consideration for you. I was in too much pain to consider you. It hurt too much. It hurt. I considered me and shuffled off this mortal coil because it just hurt too much. Any idea how that felt? That much pain? Ever considered that, Ice-Cream Boy?

  I try to blank my mind from her. It fails. She always manages to get in there.

  —I didn’t think so. So go ahead, give my death some reason. Grow some and go and tell that Canadian woman-beater what a shit he is.

  Big slow footsteps, heavy behind me. Chair legs scrape back across the tiles. One, two, three heavy bodies sit on creaking wooden chairs. It’s like I can see out of the back of my head. It’s a Western, the gunslingers have walked in and the piano stops playing, poker players stare with forgotten hands, and the barman moves the expensive bottles off the shelves. Sort of. At least everyone’s staring at whoever’s sitting behind me, but Mei’s most expensive bottles are all in the fridge and are all the same price, there is no piano, and this is a no-gambling country. But the effect is still close enough.

  I shift in my seat to look behind me. I recognise two of them as Charles’ guards and the other I’ve seen loitering in the Iguana. Here they are. The cavalry.

  —Lucky you. Don’t need your balls after all. There’s six the size of coconuts just behind you.

  —Well, I’ll do the talking. They’ll do the muscle bit.

  My confidence has grown. The moment is here and I can change the whole mood of the evening. Newbie will save the day, with a little help from his friends.

  Whispers cross the room from Barry’s table, followed by laughter.

  ‘You packed your bags yet, faggot boy?’ The Canadian voice kills the silence and my Western movie metaphor; they don’t know the muscle is my backup.

  —Go on. Be Clint Eastwood. Clean up this town.

  ‘Oh, shut the fuck up.’ The words come out loud and angry and unexpected. So much for internal conversations.

  ‘Oh, one of the girls is menstruating.’ More laughter from across the room. Mei presses the remote to turn the TV on, perhaps in some hope of calming the room.

  ‘What you doing?’ asks Julie in a hushed voice, while others stare at me.

  Three large bodies give off heat behind me.

  —Feel lucky, punk?

  —Not really, but bugger it.

  I stand. I turn.

  ‘Look out, Barry. He’ll kill with his verb tenses.’ The German strokes a large moustache that lies across a puffy, moist face, and looks to his wife, who stays expressionless. Barry sits back in his chair and smirks. Biceps I’ve never noticed before pour out from under his T-shirt sleeves.

  I look to Charles’s guards and although they are looking nowhere in particular, my balls grow. The opposite of the expected shrinkage.

  It’s like the mushrooms have kicked in again as I walk across the bar. Ten steps that feel like an hour each. During not one minute of one of those hours do I think about sitting back down, running or fainting. What’s the worst that can happen?

  —You could die.

  —If that’s the worst, then I welcome it.

  —Liar.

  —I miss you, and this here, this moment, is nothing. This is what I want. I want nothing else to care about. I’m not scared of dying.

  —Easy to say with backup.

  ‘Can you, Barry’—my finger, strangely steady, points at him— ‘please keep your mouth shut when we are in this bar?’ I’m by their table. The three of them are turned towards me. German’s wife goes to the toilet.

  ‘Sit back down, son,’ says the Englishman, wobbling on his fence.

  ‘No, not yet.’

  ‘Come and sit down,’ says Julie from behind me. Marty mutters agreement.

  ‘Fucking Newbie is back on form. Yeah. Go get him, Newbie.’

  Sighs and then silence again after Kim’s input.

  I wait, expecting to hear the sound of chair legs scraping tiles as three strong Chinese make their move. But no. Just more silence.

  Just as well. I’d do this anyway. With or without them.

  —Brave and all lack of self-care, I am impressed. But you’re going to get creamed, Ice-Cream Boy.

  —It’ll do me good. Might even wake me up. Now hush.

  ‘And I’d like you to apologise to my friend Geoff.’

  Barry shakes his head and with each shake the smirk widens.

  ‘Anything else? Fag.’ Hate pours from him like piss from a burst colostomy bag.

  ‘Stop hitting Mei.’

  He stands up, his chair flies and skids across the floor on its back.

  ‘You…’ Glasses leave his face and are placed on the table. Squidgy little eyes. People look different when you see them for the first time without glasses. They look lost.

  ‘Me what? Faggot?’ I use his favourite word. ‘Haven’t you got any other insults in that ap
e head?’

  He stutters for a second and blinks.

  ‘Pussy.’ He spits it out, but there’s not a lot of venom to his attempted strike.

  I laugh. Something strange is going on.

  —You’re not backing down, numbnuts. Keep it up. He’s floundering.

  ‘Now first, say sorry to Geoff.’

  ‘Fuck that.’ Barry takes a step to the side of the table.

  I hear a chair move behind me. No, not now. I don’t want the help now. I want the battering. I want to feel and I want to bleed.

  ‘Apologise.’ A voice from behind. An Australian voice.

  Barry squints as he looks behind me at Marty, like he’s trying to read a distant road sign. More chairs scrape across Mei’s tiled floor.

  ‘Yeah. Apologise, dude. And apologise to Mei, too, on your way out.’ These aren’t Chinese voices. That one is from Montana.

  I look behind. Marty, Jussy and Julie are standing. Kim has both hands running through his hair and Geoff, although still seated, is almost smiling at the beer bottle he holds. Kim pulls his hands out of his mop.

  ‘Fuck it, Newbie. I’m with you. Fucking apologise, Barry. You dick.’ He stands and pops a cigarette in his mouth and lights it. ‘I fucking love this country.’ Then he giggles like a four-year-old.

  The Oriental backup have heads turned away, watching football on the TV like it’s the only thing happening in the room.

  Sweat patches are spreading out across Barry’s tight-fitting T-shirt.

  ‘Fuck you, faggot.’ He steps part way around the table.

  ‘Apologise, Barry.’ A female voice, so far unheard.

  He stops again and looks at Mei, who has come out from behind her counter. In her hand is a baseball bat. This is turning into the best film I’ve seen.

  ‘Get back behind the counter, Mei. I’ll deal with you later.’

  ‘No. You apologise. Then you leave. You not come back, Barry.’

  ‘Get back behind the fucking counter, Mei, before I put you there.’

  There’s a cry from the Chinese muscle table. Reflex action means we all look.

  ‘Sorry. But Chelsea score,’ says the one in the middle. ‘You please carry on.’ He waves his hand in a general sweeping motion to indicate the rest of us and looks back to the screen.